Perfect Façades
by LittleFireDragon
Summary: After losing at his second League Conference, Gary became a researcher. But is this what he really wanted? There's a lot of pain hidden inside the psychological mess that is Gary Oak. Warning: Mild cursing and reference to suicidal thoughts.


I should start out by saying that heartbreak doesn't have to come from unrequited love. Any shattered dream will do it, really. Trust me, I'd know.

All my life I had one dream. I never really thought about what I'd do if it didn't work out. I was going to be a pokémon trainer, a pokémon master. That's as far as my plan ever went. I didn't doubt that I could do it; I _expected_ to succeed. I was _good_ at it, and I knew it! At least, I thought so. I was cocky. I was _stupid_.

That dream was the one unchanging constant in my life. I wanted to do what would have made my parents proud – I lost them when I was three, you know. Yeah, yeah, I know, I don't seem like the heartwarming orphan type. Deal with it.

But do you know what it's like, to have the very foundation of your world ripped out from under you without any warning at all? It's overwhelming. Everything you think you know about yourself, your future, everything, it all goes away. What do I do now? Who am I, if not who I always thought I was? Where do I go? Why? It's like being lost at sea in a storm, with a broken compass and a cloudy sky above. You feel lost, helpless, and strangely apathetic about the whole situation, because you've simply lost all hope.

I had no reason at all to think I would be so utterly crushed in the Indigo Championship. I'd won almost every single battle before that! Why should I think I'd lose? I'm _Gary Oak. _I felt like I was practically _entitled_ to the victory. And then fate decided to slam the door in my face. I lost in the _preliminaries! The goddamn preliminaries!_ And then, to add insult to injury, Ash got farther than I did; _Ash,_ the loser I'd beaten time and time again. I didn't even understand what had happened. I felt like I'd been lied to, betrayed, but I had no one to blame, really. So I blamed myself. I turned the pain inward. Honestly, I lost all belief that I could win at anything. That I could succeed. I wasn't good enough. All my victories had been dumb luck. Just a fluke. A strangely repeating fluke, and now my luck had run out.

At least that time I could convince myself that I hadn't actually lost to Ash, per se. A grass type can beat a water type that can beat a fire type, but that doesn't mean the grass type is stronger than the fire type. That's the metaphor I used to comfort myself. It worked for a while, but I could never fully convince myself that I wasn't just a failure, a complete loser.

I didn't want _them_ to know that, though. I especially didn't want to give Ash the satisfaction of knowing all that. So I put up my first façade. Everyone noticed the change. They said I was nicer, charming even. That I was finally a well-adjusted boy with a healthy level of self-esteem. _Hah_. So funny I forgot to laugh.

Do you have any idea what it's like to go into _every_ battle with just one nagging question at the back of your mind, tormenting you? I do. Over and over and over again: _How will I screw up this time?_ Even when I was winning, even when I had the victory from the start, I fully expected to lose it all at the last minute. Whenever I _did_ boast, it was when I'd already won – I didn't believe it myself until that moment. If I bragged beforehand, I knew, Lady Luck would do her damnedest to make a fool out of me. Sometimes I think others caught a glimpse of the self-doubt. That's usually when I bragged after the fact, to dispel the idea that I didn't think I would win.

Of course I knew I had that one from the start. I'm the _perfect _trainer. I couldn't possibly have been worrying, mere moments ago, about how I would lose this time.

But never too much bragging. That level of confidence, I'm not sure how, but I knew, that… _arrogance_… it would land me in trouble. I desperately avoided it, as though that would help me avoid trouble. The last thing I needed was to be humiliated again.

Of course, guess what happened.

I took a second chance. Another attempt at the Championship. Guess who failed spectacularly? Me. And guess what? This time I lost _directly_ to Ash. _Ouch. _Sometimes I feel like my only purpose in life is to give Ash someone to look impressive defeating. It would certainly explain everything. I always beat him when the outcome ultimately doesn't matter, but if it's important, suddenly the guy who has lost to me time and time again turns around and mops the floor with me. It's like my victories are only there to make me look like a worthy opponent, so that Ash will just look _that_ much better beating the shit out of me in front of millions of people. It doesn't even make sense! It isn't fair!

Anyway, I lost. It was all I could do to stop myself from crying in front of all those people. Seriously, that's what I felt like doing: just dropping to my knees and letting out all that pain. But I couldn't. I had to keep my cool. I could cry later, when nobody could see me, when nobody was listening (and believe me, I did). While I was busy with that, I guess I kinda went into autopilot mode. I said things I didn't mean, just to defend myself. To save face. Part of me wishes I hadn't. Yeah, I would have been made a laughingstock, but at least I wouldn't have to bottle up my feelings like this. At least I wouldn't be trapped in my own web of lies! Saving face. I hate those words: saving face.

And what better way to save face upon losing _again_, than to shrug and say, "meh, I never really wanted that anyway. My _real_ dream is to be a Professor, like my grandfather." _Damn it_, Gary. And again, I couldn't let all those people know what was really going on. I had to stick to it.

So here I am, living a lie. I congratulate the people who've beaten me, even as looking them in the eye breaks my heart. I make "friends" with them, to avoid more pain. People ask me if I'm happy in my new "career", so I lie through my teeth. I hide behind this mask. I smile and tell them I've never been better.

Of _course_ I don't mind that I lost, being a trainer wasn't really even my thing, anyway. Of _course_ I'm happy! I'm Gary Oak; I'm _perfect!_

I hate it. I have to keep doing something I hate and pretending I'm having the time of my life doing it. I have to keep smiling. Of _course_ I'm not hurting inside. I'm above that.

I don't know how much longer I can keep smiling. Sooner or later, something has to give. I'll break down eventually, and when I do, I don't know any more than you do what will happen. Maybe I'll have a violent outburst and hurt someone or destroy something; maybe I'll just break down crying in the middle of the lab or during an interview or something; maybe I'll kill myself; maybe I'll go insane and have to go to an asylum; who knows? Maybe I'm cracking right now. I don't know.

Sometimes I think the smile falters, and then I have to cover it up somehow. Crying? No, I haven't been crying. It's just allergy season. What do you mean you thought you heard me sobbing? I was coughing – I'm getting over a cold. What do you mean I look depressed? I was just lost in thought. How could I be depressed? I'm a perfect guy living a perfect life!

It's all a lie, of course. And it _hurts_. I'm being crushed under all these façades I've put up. But what else can I do? I keep lying, and smiling, and pretending… and hurting.

Anything to keep them from figuring out that my losses _broke__ me._


End file.
